This disclosure is directed to rotatable fasteners to connect an attachable component to a base or anchor. More particularly, it is directed to an arrangement for verification of a completed connection between the fastener and the base.
In the assembly of various structures, for example automotive vehicles, rotatable fasteners commonly referred to as “quarter turn” fasteners are often employed to attach equipment to the vehicle body. One such use involves attachment of side curtain airbags to the roof rail of the vehicle. Such fasteners advantageously attach to a base plate or anchor previously secured to the roof rail. Such fasteners may also include an energy absorption mechanism which, on inflation of the curtain airbag, absorbs energy of inflation to reduce the resultant force application to the vehicle structure. Such a fastener is known, and is disclosed in International Publication WO 2010/117322, published Oct. 14, 2010, and entitled “Fastener for Air Bag Curtain.”
In the assembly of consumer products such as automotive vehicles, manufacturers take precautions to ensure ultimate quality and reliability of the product. Quality assurance involves review and inspection of processes involved in assembly to verify the accomplishment of specific tasks, such as correct and complete connection and fixation of attached elements. Quality control is an important aspect of the securement of fasteners such as described for affixation of the curtain airbag within an automotive vehicle.
Commonly, electronic recognition equipment is employed to monitor the assembly process. Often such electronic sensing is associated with a central processing unit (computer) which, in response to a recognized anomaly, provides output signals to trigger an alarm or other signal, or control an action.
One effective approach to verification is to provide bar code numerization of components to be secured and program the computer to generate an output signal in response to the results of the comparison of input data received from verification sensing to information stored in the computer readable medium.
The present disclosure applies the bar code recognition function available at the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) to ensure complete and proper affixation of the fasteners to the base anchors. Toward that end, the fastener is configured to block scannable access to the bar code indicia unless affixation to the vehicle roof rail is correct and complete.